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    TRAINING ANI) STKAINING.*

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    than have hitherto been recognised by physiologists " amongst Xm « o affinity of 1 anguage will be found , " He then dehvers himself of a strong opinion , that " the theories currentas to the derivation . of the many varieties of the human race , _ fi ™» _« £ primitive ' types , will . not-bear examination . Wevthink it right-to record this dictum , though we have not space now to discuss it as a proposition , much less to enter into the various ramifications ot ara-ument and doctrine to which it would logically lead . Sir John Bowling ' s theory of language we must quote , as he repeats it more than once , and would , therefore , appear desirous ot raising a question on it :-r—; "A great variety of languages is to be found among the wild people of the interior . Not only are dialects of the various tribes unmtelhgible to each other , tut sometimes a language is confined to a single family group . Where there has been no intercourse , there is no similitude . Words are **<*¦*• * »**»! nytA Tanatuiae is created by that necessity . . Hence , trie

    „„ , „„ ,, further the study of idioms is pursued back into antiquity , thegreaterwill i ; heir number be found . Civilization has destroyed hundreds , perhaps thousands , of idioms , and is still carrying on the wori ^ diminishing the number of languages in which man holds intercourse with man . ^ It rs no bold prophecy to aver that in tke course of centuries , the niintber of separate tongues will be reduced to a small amojint . In . France , the French ; m Italy , the Tuscan ; in Spain , the Castilian ; in Germany , the Saxon ; m Great Britain , the English , are becoming the Predominant languages of the people , and have been gradually superseding the multitude of idioms which were used only a few generations ago . Adelung recorded . the names of nearly 4 , 000 spoken and existing languages , but u list of those which time has extinguished would be far more extensive .

    Of an entirely different character is Dr . Russell ' s work on India . The author went forth to see "the reed shaken by-the wind , and returns to tell us what he saw , and how it was shaken . He was accompanied by Mr . Lundgren , who has supplied the several illustrations to the work . Our readers must not expect from us an analvsis , —so much depends upon the writer ' s style , that they must read * the book for themselves . None but his own words * formstance , can describe the manner in which the report of Havelock s death was received at Alexandria . He regrets that England has not her just is decidedl

    share of moral influence in the East . The civilization y French j diplomatic communications European literature , are French . The bazaars are full of portraits of Bonaparte and Kleber , and pictures of the battle of the Pyramids . His description of the Desert , and thersentiment it inspires , is most striking . One amusing anecdote , in the midst of ail , he tells us , of an attempt by a native barber at Suez to shave him while he slept . He found it was esteemed the ekefd ' ceuvre of Asiatic tonsbrial art to shave . a man while slumbering without waking him : _ , ¦' ^ . . . ¦ . Lord is

    Our author ' s account and portrait of Canning highly creditable to the Governor-general , and testifies to his very great abilities , as well as to his singular courtesy . The traveller was on his way to Cawnpore , and preparing for an introduction to Sir Colin Campbell , the Commander-in-Chief . Dr . Russell was naturally anxious about the truth of the statements concerning mutilated women , but , up to this point , he was unable to meet with a single instance , _ Dr . Russell shows much , sympathy for the Hindoo race , and wonders that we are not more careful of our conduct in those distant regions . Were the wrongs we permit committed nearer home , he is of opinion that they would not be so quietly allowed . He mentions with indignation his heaving " that the menagerie of the King of Oude ; as much his private property as his \ vatch or turban , were sold under discreditable circumstances , and his jewels seized

    and impounded , though we had . no more claim on them than on the crowiV diamonds of Russia . Do the English people care for these things P" asks Dr . Russell ; " do they know them ? The hundred millions of Hindostan know them well , and care about them too . " The diary form in which this book is written , though it might furnish good extracts if it were our cue to giye them , causes the personal so to dominate over the historical , that it requires much careful reading to extract from it the information desirable as the substance of a review . The volumes present a series of dioramio pictures as they daily pass before the eyes of the author , and to describe these were to rewrite the journal of which they form the contents . Dr . Russell , however , paints his scenes with the pencil of a novice , and he confesses it . lie has to learn every thing , ns he coin * ses along j so that his Diary does not describe India as it is , but the state of the writers mind as to India . He gains his experience bit by bit , and

    wo gain it with him . His " look ftt Cuwnpove , " and his meeting there with Azimoola Khan , are both mnrkworthy , both for the incidents and the reflections . His description of the siege of Lucknow is appalling . His life in camp , seems to have been made for him exceedingly pleasant , and the confidence placed in him by the Oommandor-m-Ohief almost unlimited . But Dr . Russell has a full sense of the horrors of war , and treats thorn as horrors . Ho has no tendency to translate their guilt into glory . Ho refuses to be unjust to the native , and censures his own countrymen freely . Our conduct towards the King of Delhi ho condomns ^ in up measured terms . He sees rightly that our own safety in India depends pn the extinction of the faults by which its Government has been fatully distinguished .

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    necessity of earnestness in the pursuit of every ^ Jjeet life . •« What is worth doing , is worth doing well / might be his motto . Bv self-help he really means industry , perseverance , energy , courage , and self-denial ; and he seeks to illustrate his subject by copious examples of men who have arrived at fame ,, through every obstacle of birth arid fortune . The book is , indeed , a compi ^ ssed biographical dictionary . Mr . Smiles does not add much of liis own libretto to his characters ; he lets them pretty well play their own part , and by a constant succession , by an interminable repetition of the same ovamnlfts of strone will , perseverance , success , he seeks to impress

    those characteristics indelibly on his hearers , —his book is , in tact , a most valuable collection of biographical sketches or extracts ( illustrations of character and conduct , he calls them ) , collected with much industry , and carefully and skilfully arranged , which , taken with his own exhortations , which are distinguished by an unusual weight of true wisdom and a rare eloquence , —form a volume of most powerful rhetoric in favour of the virtues he inculcates . No one can read the book , and get up without feeling that man without those virtues is naught ; nay more , without the fancy , that hard work is some preternatural agent that can effect results almost beyond the scope of human conception _ ... .. ^ ^ . work thenis to that is

    The ostensible object of the , prove success not to be obtained without diligence , self-denial , and determination . But it does not stop here : we are bound to say that Mr . Smiles has conjured up such a terrible picture of the hardships entailed by success in this world , that it becomes a question whether some sort Of failure may not be preferable . " . All work and no play , all work and no play , " he says in effect ; " mind that—as you would live no play ! Look at so and so , and so and so—they didn't go to bed for a week ; they fed on crusts , they laboured day and night , and at odd hours besides : ceaseless toil , if you please , my friends ! It is this—if you make up your mind to be a grinder , you must never cease grinding ; never look to the right or left ; let nature , let man ( and woman ) pass ; stick to your grindstone , and you will become such an admirable grinder , that people will not know the difference between you and a genius : " ' ¦ '

    _ . _ ... .. . - , , . , ..... ,.. _ But let alone grinding , is > nything ; worth being bought at such a price as this ? Is there not something nobler , after all , than hard work even ? Has Providence given us this pleasing anxious being , merely for the use of the workshop , or the study ? Are the beautiies of nature , the affections , the delights of the senses ; to count for nothing , except to such as make them the objects of their study P Success was meant ' . to minister to man , not man to place his nature in the balance against success . If the human mind has had allotted to it stern duties while it remains on this earth , it lias also been endowed with sensation 3 of extreme delight . Their origin is common , and it is no doubt intended that they should be used together . " To- show that we are doing no iiijustice : to Mr . Smiles , we will t

    quote a few of his examples of workers—thus , Arkwrighworked for seventeen hours a day , and began to learn the English grammar at fifty ; his time was so valuable , that he always travelled with four horses . Watt was thirty years upon his condensing engine , and Stephenson twenty-five upon his locomotive , Walter Scott as a copying clerk managed to copy one hundred and twenty pages of MS . in the twenty ^ four hours . When a clerk in the Court of Session he got up at five every morning , lighted his own fire , and did his literary work before breakfast . John Britton worked sixteen hours a day . Loudon sat up two whole nights a week to study * while working like a labourer all day . Joseph Hume got up at six , worked all day , and outsat the House of Commons every night . Hale studied sixteen hours a day —Hume the historian wrote thirteen— -Hunter allowed himself but

    five hours' sleep in the twenty-four—Jemier was twenty years in perfecting vaccimition- *^ Herschel , while in the band of the Bath pump * room , finished two hundred specula before he made one that would suit -his telescope—; Titian worked daily for seven years at tlie " Last Supper" - —M eyerbeer studies music fox * fifteen hours a day ^—Giardiiu said it would take twelve hours a day for twenty years to learn the violin , and Taglioni could only arrive at her perfection ir » dancing , by constantly practising until she fainted . Fojey , the founder of the present noble family of that name , worked his passage twice to Sweden and back , and supported himself there as a fiddler for several years , in order to learn tlio secret of splitting" iron . Eldon rose at four in the morning , and worked till late nt night , with a wet towel round his head to keep him awake—but there is no necessity to multiply instances of the labour of lawyers , History and biography are rife with thorn , and the shelves of muny a library attest an industry that is almost superhuman .

    But what is this success in life after all P To have accomplished an undertaking that will benefit the human race till the end of time , to have made a nmnie that will never bo spoken without a thrill of triumph , are , indeed , noble results , well worth striving for ,- ^ -ulmost , but not ¦ qnjfc © , _ woi th , the ousting 1 overboard of human weakness and human pleasure . But how many can attain this P How many have attained it P There is necessarily a limit , not only to the subjects which will confer such a fume , but to the persona who are capable of reaching 1 it . How many of our readers have heard of Elihu Burritt P Yet he probably worked harder than any man that

    over lived ; while earning his living as a blacksmith he learnt forty languages ! ' Mr . Smilea ' a creed is , in fact , a muscular one , " The fable of tho labours of Hercules , " ho anys , ia indeed the type of all human doing and success . " Hard work is really a . quustipn of p hysical strength ; and ,, to , do Mr . Smiles justice , he fully luilniowledgeB , iti the latter part of his book , the necessity of physical education ns a help to the intellect ; and herein it appears to uu that he is hardly connmtont . At one time it is " given it iimu with « strong will and ceaseless industry , and ho c « n do anything 1 ; even

    Mb . Smiths s vaiuabjo and inHtruoti . vp bqok is founded , ns ho tells us , upon nn introductory lecture , cleHv . evQd by him to a Booioty of worlnnir men in a northern town ; its object is . to inculcate the

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    [ of e 8 Tke Leader andISa ^ day Analys t . Jan , 21 , 1800 .

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    * Salf . JIolpf with JClluatratiottf of Qharaptor and Oondnot . BySAMGBfc Shilbs , author of the " Wo of George Stophonaon . " London ; John Murray , 1359 .

    Training Ani) Stkaining.*

    TBAINING AND STRAINING . *

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 21, 1860, page 68, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2330/page/16/